| Samruddhi Ghodgaonkar | July 2024 | Short Story |

On a cloudless June evening in 2020, you sleep-walked through the exit of Dabolim Airport, lugging a skew-wheeled suitcase behind. Each successive squeak piled onto your frustration. Between catching the earliest direct flight from Heathrow, then getting on a connecting flight from Mumbai, there wasn’t enough time for the hassle of buying a new suitcase. You searched for a taxi outside the deserted arrivals lounge, ignoring your stomach pangs and the shuttered faces of cafes. It felt like you hadn’t taken a proper breath since getting the call from your father’s nurse two days ago. ‘Boss, your Pai’s health has taken a turn for the worse’, the nurse’s harried voice vibrated through your phone’s speaker, its sound waves dispersing into a column of artificial light overhead. 

The N95 mask provided by the airline as part of governmental protocol, covered half your face. The heaviness accumulated in your chest, sloshed around at every step. Discarding the mask would make you feel like an exhibit.  

The wide, gleaming road across, remained empty. Forlorn signs spelling ‘Don’t Halt’ outside the exit, endured that evening’s interminable sunset, the signage redundant in the absence of the usual carousel of endless vehicles at Dabolim. 

You heard movement. Instead of a taxi driver’s weathered face, it was a common blind snake that made you step back. Beckoning with its forked tongue, it invited you to follow. You smoothened out the wrinkles over your custom-tailored shirt, still in search of a taxi. The snake refused to leave, drawing impatient lines on the street. A long sigh escaped through your lips. The setting summer sun hung, resolute, while you pictured the extensive hike to Pai’s house and followed the blind snake with heavy, bitter feet. On the way, it halted for an accidental meal or two upon spotting termites. You rang Pai’s nurse, coaxing her to return to duty. 

‘No can do, Boss. The havaldars on patrol are beating up anyone who isn’t out for groceries or medicine. I sneaked down to the house for a few weeks since the lockdown started but now they monitor the local routes as well. I can’t risk it any longer.  You can call me anytime, boss and I’ll walk you through Pai’s routine.’  

Before you could think of a compelling persuasion, she hung up. 

The blind snake had already slithered on. Its impatience and unyielding nature reminded you of Pai. The moment you could walk and eat by yourself, he left you to figure out the syntax of the world by yourself. Mai and your grandparents were discouraged from doing your share of the chores or mending your clothes, even tying your shoelaces. You tended to your own wounds and injuries after a fight or a fall. Sometimes, Mai dabbed ointment with a ball of cotton or gently blew over an angry scrape in Pai’s absence and allowed your head in her lap, patting until you fell asleep. You greedily absorbed her tender gestures- her little apologies for Pai’s stilted methods of communication. Sometimes, you wondered whether Pai would inflict the same behaviour on imaginary siblings and secretly felt relieved that you didn’t have any. 

The snake abandoned you midway, as the sky turned a murky blue with the first stars almost visible. You found the main road, trudging along its edge, the suitcase wheel completely broken by now. While checking the navigation app on your phone, a message from Luke flashed. You stumbled in the torchlight’s beam, fighting off the impulse to send an immediate reply. Grandmother’s Hole Beach was at an apparent three-kilometre distance yet you felt like you had been walking for days on one of Mai’s pilgrimages. A passing townsperson decelerated his scooter upon spotting you and offered a ride saying he recognised Pai’s son. The entire way to the house, your suitcase between his legs, he rambled on about how the town remained unchanged, probing into your life abroad, why you hadn’t married yet and that the town missed Mai, her prawn balchao, Ambot Tik, spicy Sorpotel and sausage-topped pizzas, her frequent parties and infamous home-made feni concoction. 

After dropping you off at Pai’s house, he glanced at the dark windows. 

‘Hey, Seb, it’s good that you returned. It’s been difficult for your Pai- these last couple of years.’ You couldn’t think of a reply and refused conjuring up any sympathy.      

Either Pai or his friends had rather unsuccessfully attempted building a boundary wall out of sea-worn rocks from the beach. Over the stairs, the house stooped more with each step you ascended, its worn walls shyly stepping out of the insatiate shadows. Chirping crickets were punctuated by the occasional toad’s croak. Overlooking the beach, Pai’s house let off fatigued sighs with each gentle rush of waves. Pushing open the unbolted door, you dragged your feet and the broken suitcase, tumbled onto the couch, engulfed by a dust cloud. You coughed a bit, felt the particles settle all over and closed your eyes.

You woke up, gritty-eyed, to the noise of shattered ceramic. It was past lunch time. There were three missed calls from Pai’s nurse. In the kitchen, Pai froze when he noticed your presence, like he had been caught with his trousers down, so did the ginger cat at his feet that was licking its paw. Pai stared wistfully after the cat darted out, then sat at the dining table. 

‘Are you Miss D’Mello’s assistant?’  

You stared at him in disbelief. 

‘Pai, you don’t recognise me?’

It was the first time you caught an apology over his features.

You banged the pan over the gas ring, going through the cupboards and the fridge, the clatter making Pai flinch. Between bites of crusty stale bread, you rang the nurse. 

It was going to be a long godforsaken day…

***

The box of a hundred N95 masks you had cautiously bought from Boots, became your aegis whether you went grocery shopping or stocked up the medicine cabinet, whether you cooked meals or cleaned the house. 

The first couple of weeks had been the hardest: readjusting your circadian rhythm to the time difference and Pai’s routine, getting used to the humidity, but most of all, immunizing yourself against the blanket of ammonia- of an inescapable sense of decay that occupied the house.  Pai wasn’t that middle-aged person going through a midlife crisis whom you remembered- he had become one of those Lilliputians from Gulliver’s Travels: cracking the top side of the boiled egg, parting his wispy hair in the middle or wearing shoes in bed. He threw tantrums when you forgot to do any of it in his way, ran off to the nearest room and hurled his emaciated frame against the doors, barring your entry. The first time it happened, you pled with him until dawn, too scared to kick the door down lest it come off its hinges or somehow hurt Pai. You sifted for patience from a bowl of anxiety and resentment. 

Pai reminded you of Delhi when you first arrived in the city: vexing, brutal and reactive. After you moved there for attending university, the city’s vocabulary almost broke you until you visited Humayun’s tomb on a whim. You understood then that Delhi could be quiet and powerful too, with its set of tombs and monuments commemorating death, right across streets bustling with unapologetic life. After you stayed long enough, Delhi revealed its beauty hidden in Urdu ghazals, Azaan piercing the dawn and its secret libraries- the stories embedded amongst generations of its inhabitants.

Pai’s tantrums were easier to handle after a while. Since he reminded you of Delhi, you began inserting here and there between the silences, the closed doors and the chirping crickets, of your grainy sepia-tinted escapades from university. Over the course of Pai’s latest tantrum, you stopped just short of confessing your first boyfriend’s name, about how it had ended. Back against the doors, heartbeat racing, you felt them open. Pai tugged at his ear, brows furrowed, glistening tongue visible through his toothless mouth. You stood up, avoiding his gaze. Before drifting off to sleep, a thought persisted, tinged with regret: you should have faced Pai’s reaction.

The first monsoon rain made you realise how ineffectual the roof had become over the long years by sea.  You gathered anything that could hold water- Pai’s favourite flower vases, planters, pans and casserole dishes, kadaais, buckets, empty food containers, kettles and old shoes, a peeling chest of drawers. You even removed the last of your clothes from the broken-wheeled suitcase and used it for catching the leak in Pai’s bedroom- the most persistent one of them all. The stray ginger cat took refuge with Pai in the living room, both invading the sofa that had become your sleeping spot. 

You found a pitiful pile of discoloured tiles and a ladder behind Pai’s house so on a day when it drizzled, you decided to fix the leaks. Laying the terracotta tiles was quite easy but fixing them in place seemed impossible. You foraged some branches and wove a thick net, placed uneven patches of it under the tiles, hoping it would suffice. In your distant childhood, an elderly aunty in town, reminiscent of melted ice cream with a kind gaze, had taught the kids some weaving techniques. 

You wished that Mai’s old clothes had still remained in the house- you could have laid them under the tiles as further insulation. Perhaps you would have stolen her oldest, most worn dress, laundered and ironed it so that not a single crease marred the fabric- just the way she liked it- and then, carried it with you everywhere, folded and buried in your broken suitcase. But Pai had either burnt or given away all her belongings years ago, the occasional donation presented with his caveat that the item must never be used in his presence.

Monsoons reminded you of your first job in Mumbai. The humidity caressed your cheek and summoned to mind, Pai’s house that used to be home, the errant Portuguese words that Mai tossed between her habitual Konkani lengths of sentences while talking with her group of friends or a neighbour. Sometimes, when you sat on the chowpatty beach in evenings, the sea took off a layer of sand instead of depositing one as the waves receded, laying bare your interminable, dormant ache of Mai’s absence.  

In the end, you took the next available job out of the country and fled. At the time, it felt like the only option. After spending two months caring for Pai, cleaning the mix of urine and bodily waste from his bedpan at four in the morning or his other accidents, you wished you could flee from this house once again. Pai’s nurse called once a week for updates. You wondered why she cared when she wouldn’t be getting paid anymore. You ignored Luke’s messages while furiously scrubbing the sink or removing mould or overcooking rice gruel. Every couple of days, you placed Pai’s scarecrow frame in the bucket filled with lukewarm water and diligently started scrubbing the hard soles of his feet up till the ribs poking out of his chest. By the time you were wiping moisture off his rooster-like neck, a lump caught your throat, followed closely by a wave of revulsion. 

Once while checking his blood pressure, you began speaking about Mai. The more you spoke, the more Pai retreated into himself. You were well-versed in your father tongue by now: reading his face was like memorising Kanji strokes. His withdrawal felt like a hollow victory- a conquest of insurmountable steel and glass in the London skyline. It immediately made you want to call Luke and listen to his soft, assured voice. 

The monsoon ended abruptly. You wanted to visit the beach because the sea had finally turned milder. Through cashew and palm trees, you carried Pai on your back. The pristine beach had a stony ridge stubbornly cutting through the sea. The indigo water tempered Pai’s weight on your back.

Urdu, Marathi, English- over the decades, you had worn language like cloth to fit into each landscape of your migration. The primordial sea waves at Grandmother’s Hole, however, eroded the sands of insulation around your nucleus, unearthing your earliest spoken syllable- ‘Raavaré!’ It was something everyone said to stop the bus, it was shouted every day by those who lived here. You repeated the word for Pai. He regarded you with surprise. 

In broken Konkani, you narrated a childhood memory for him: Pai had just bought a powder blue Fiat and his friend challenged him to test-drive it on the beach. The kids were playing tag when they noticed the car stuck in sand. Pai wasn’t helping matters with his constant acceleration, the wheel simply sunk deeper. Mai came over, yelling to keep his foot off the pedal and pushed the car alongside the kids until it was free. 

For the first time in decades, you actually held Pai’s gaze afterwards. He tugged at his ear. His glistening tongue peeked out of his smiling toothless mouth. 

  At night, in the half life between dreams and wakefulness, you became six years old again, running through the open doors of Pai’s house, unstoppable, following the scent of yeast and flour and eggs, until you reached the bakery. 

‘Ajjo, ek pav ladi!’, you shouted and jumped, head bouncing over the counter. 

He handed you a dozen sweet buns, fresh out of the oven. In that half life, you couldn’t resist the temptation of tearing off a piece. The steaming cloud of bread melted in your mouth. 

Upon awakening, the scent from your half life lingered. Pai stood by your bed, a plate of golden sweet buns in hand. The stray ginger cat slinked inside behind him and laid down a snakeskin. Pai’s Konkani words garbled in their delivery: ‘Seb, Tu gharat paratla, mhun mhaka khos jata.’ -I’m glad that you made it back home, Seb. 

Pai handed me a warm bun. I devoured it along with his note of welcome within seconds. Like Lemuel Gulliver, Pai had returned home after decades of travelling to distant islands. As had you. 

A message from Luke flashed on your phone: The restrictions over flying had eased. 

He missed you. He was coming home. 

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Samruddhi is a fiction writer currently working on her debut novel. Her fiction has been published in Usawa Literary Review, The Bombay Literary Magazine, The Chakkar and elsewhere. She was one of the runners-up for the Deodar Prize 2023 at the Bangalore Literature Festival.

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Homepage image by Amal K Raju via Unsplash 

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